


What I'm Trying to Say

by TolkienScholar23



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Brotherly Love, Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Oneshot collection, episode tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-14
Updated: 2018-10-29
Packaged: 2019-08-01 20:29:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 13,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16291238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TolkienScholar23/pseuds/TolkienScholar23
Summary: No matter how worried, hurt, or exhausted he is, Dean somehow can never bring himself to be truly vulnerable with his brother. Luckily, Sam usually understands what he's trying to say. Impressions on all the times in Season 1 when Dean Winchester didn't say what he really meant.





	1. Impersonal

**Author's Note:**

> The concept for this fic came from a Tumblr post by sebastiansttan, saying, "Dean Winchester doesn't say, 'I love you.' He says..." What follows is a bunch of pictures with quotes in which Dean shows his love through his protectiveness. It really got me thinking about all the times in this show Dean doesn't say what he really means, and next thing I knew, I was writing. Enjoy, and if you feel so inclined, please leave a review!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x1: "Pilot"

"And I'll tell you another thing: If you screwed up my car, I'll kill you."

Even as the words come out of his mouth, Dean hates himself for saying them. It's not that he's said something wrong, because Sammy laughs, that "I can't believe my brother's such an idiot" laugh he remembers from when they were kids, when he'd start making wisecracks about the spirits they were hunting to keep them both from being scared. It takes him back to a simpler, happier time.

He hates himself because it wasn't what he wanted to say. He has so many words and phrases spinning around in his head, so many things he would like to tell Sammy right now. Things like, _"That took guts, driving her in through the wall like that. I'm not sure I would ever have thought of it. I'm really proud of you."_

Or, _"Man, it's been good to have you by my side again. I've missed you so much."_

Or maybe, _"When I saw you in the car with that witch on top of you, I just about went ballistic. I'm surprised I didn't do something stupider than try to shoot the ghost in the head."_

Or even just, _"Those burns on your chest—they look pretty bad. Are you sure you're okay?"_

The thing is, there was a time when he might have been able to say those things. Not that he's ever been good at sharing his feelings—he's always had a horror of "chick flick moments"—but he used to be able to talk to Sammy. They used to be close.

Now, though, he's not even sure he knows Sam anymore. Some things haven't changed: Sam's still an out-of-the-box problem solver; he still somehow remembers everything Dad taught him about hunting; he still disapproves of Dean's eating habits; he still sleeps on his back with his arms crossed over his stomach or one hand curled up in that cute little way by his head.

But other things… other things are different. He's got so much anger and resentment toward Dad, and maybe toward him, too. He's given up on finding Mom's killer, given up on her altogether. The way he talked about her—it still angers Dean. He's glad he was able to stop Sam's apology earlier, because he's not sure he's ready to forgive him for that yet. And then—perhaps the ultimate source of the disconnect between them—Sam's determined to be normal, to have a normal job and a normal wife and normal kids and a normal little house in a normal little suburb.

He's on a path that Dean can't follow and wouldn't want to if he could.

So with all that going on, maybe it's best to keep it impersonal. And that, he knows, is why he settles on the one sentence floating around in his head that isn't sentimental, that doesn't make him vulnerable in any way:

"If you screwed up my car, I'll kill you."

And Sammy laughs. For now, that'll have to be good enough.


	2. Mm-hmm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x2: "Wendigo"

_"Mm-hmm"_ can mean a lot of things.

For Dean, it means, _"Yeah, actually I was planning to eat that last piece of pie, but you know what, go ahead. Now, see how much I love you?"_ Or it might mean, _"I definitely totally understand that obscure Biblical reference you just made and how it applies to our current situation. Now, can we go back to sending this demon to Hell where it belongs?"_ Or even, on occasion, _"Yeah, of course I got enough sleep last night. That wasn't me you saw pacing up and down the hallway because I couldn't get that dead boy's face out of my head. You must be seeing things, Sammy."_

For Sam, it usually means something quite different. It can mean, _"I hear what you're saying, but I don't believe you. I know you're lying."_ Or, _"You don't get it, do you? I'm just trying to help. Why won't you listen to me?"_ Or especially, _"We are not done talking about this, but I'll leave you alone for a little while."_

Dean has never liked Sam's definitions of _"Mm-hmm."_ They're always just a little too personal, a little too perceptive. They'll let Dean retreat into his shell, but they won't let him feel quite comfortable there. _"Mm-hmm"_ reminds him that whatever he's trying to hide, Sam probably already knows a lot more about it than he'd like him to.

Never in a billion years would he have thought he'd be using _"Mm-hmm"_ that way now. He never thought he'd need to. Sam isn't supposed to be the one hiding his sufferings and shutting his brother out.

 _"Perfectly okay."_ Nobody loses their girlfriend to the same supernatural fiend that killed their mother and then one week later is "perfectly okay." There's no way Sam could possibly think he believes that crap, is there? Sure, Dean has never been the touchy-feely, _"tell me how you're doing"_ type, but he's lied about being okay enough times to know when someone else is doing it, especially his little brother, of all people. Just because he never talks about feelings doesn't mean he doesn't pay attention. He knows what's going on with Sam; he always has. He just prefers to deal with the problem instead of wasting time talking about it.

Only, this isn't a problem he can shoot a flare gun at. Not least because whatever killed his brother's girlfriend seems to be partially made of fire, but even if they can track down this thing and kill it, Sam's still not going to be okay. Jessica is gone, and Sammy is going to have to live with that grief, revenge or no. And Dean can't help him learn to do that if Sam won't even admit to him that anything is wrong. His genius brother probably knows What's-His-Face's However-Many Stages of Grief (if that's something they even teach at college; Dean has no idea), but he hasn't had to deal with loss like Dean has. True, losing your girlfriend as an adult isn't the same as losing your Mom at the age of four, but there's got to be some way he can help, if only Sammy would let him.

But instead, it's,  _"Look, man. You're worried about me. I get it. And, thank you, but… I'm perfectly okay."_  How's he supposed to respond to that? What magic words can he say that'll knock down the iron walls his brother's constructed around his heart? Is there even anything  _to_  say?

Yeah, there is one thing. Something he's said before, but never in this way, never in the way Sam does.

"Mm-hmm."

_"We are not done talking about this, but I'll leave you alone for a little while."_


	3. What Makes Me Brave

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x3: "Dead in the Water"

There has never been a time when Sam didn't know what happened to his Mom.  _Exactly_  what happened. Down to the last traumatic, gory detail that was totally inappropriate for a 2-year-old, a 5-year-old, a 9-year-old to know.

Dad used to sit them down and go through the story, sometimes as often as once a week, sometimes more. He would push himself to remember more details, to think of anything new that might provide a clue as to where to go next. And he would make Dean talk about it, too. Even now, Sam still can't forget the agonized look on his older brother's face when Dad used to try to force the information out of him that so obviously just wasn't there. Dean was only in the doorway to Sam's nursery for a few seconds before Dad sent him outside, and besides, he was only four at the time. Dean has always wanted to please Dad so badly, but in this one area he was never able to give him what he wanted. Those sessions with Dad were some of the few times in Sam's life he remembers seeing Dean cry.

There's one thing, though, that Sam is sure Dean never shared. Something he's never once heard him say until this moment, crouched on the floor in front of Lucas trying to break through the kid's wall of silence. Sam has never heard him say, "I was scared."

Sam remembers asking him one night, around the age of eight. It was after another of those grueling sessions with Dad. Dean was twelve then, and he didn't cry anymore no matter how hard Dad was on him, but Sam had known he was hurting inside.

"Dean?" he'd asked when they were finally alone in their bedroom. "The night Mom died—were you scared?"

Dean had looked at him hard for a minute, and Sam hadn't been able to read his face. Then some of the fire had come back into his eyes, and he'd shaken his head. "No, Sammy. I wasn't scared. I knew I had to be brave."

And Sam had believed him. It was what he'd wanted to believe. His brother was his hero, and heroes weren't supposed to be scared. It took years for Sam to finally come to grips with the fact that what Dean had told him that night was a big fat lie.

Still, Dean has never admitted it. Just like he never admits to any other form of weakness, to being tired or depressed or in pain. Playing the tough guy is Dean's MO, and Sam has accepted that it will never be any other way.

And now this kid comes along. There's something about Lucas, something that has touched Dean in a part of his soul Sam has never been able to reach. Dean's never liked kids, Sam only excepted, but there's some sort of connection between him and Lucas, born of having experienced the loss of a parent to something unnatural at an age just old enough to remember and just young enough not to understand. Somehow, that connection is enough to bring the words to Dean's lips that he hasn't spoken in twenty-two years: "I was scared." It feels like a revelation, though in his heart Sam has known it for a long time.

Part of what Dean told him when they were kids wasn't a lie, though—he truly had been brave that night. What Sam has never thought to wonder is where that bravery came from. Now, he has the answer:  _"I know my Mom would have wanted me to be brave. I think about that every day. And I try to be brave."_  Sam has never questioned Dean's bravery, never imagined that Dean might have to look anywhere other than his own strength to find the courage he displays every single day. But all along, it's been because of Mom. It's her memory, however faint and fading it might be, that has kept him going all these years.

And maybe that's why Sam didn't keep going. Why he tried to get away from hunting, to get away from this life of hardship and misery and horror. He doesn't remember Mom at all, not even in the distant way Dean does, so her death doesn't motivate him like that. Maybe that's why it's only now, with Jessica's death so fresh in his mind, that Sam has finally found his own courage.

 _Jessica would have wanted me to be brave,_  he thinks. Yes. It's true. She always believed in him implicitly, never doubting that he could accomplish whatever he set his mind to. True, what he had set his mind to back then was getting into law school, not hunting down a murderous spirit, but he has a hunch that if Jess had known the truth then, if he had somehow managed to tell her and get her to believe him, she would have had just as much confidence in his hunting skills as she did in his potential to succeed as a lawyer. She would have assured him of his success, just as she did with the interview. She would have wanted him to have the courage to keep going.

" _Brave."_  Brave has always been what Dean was. Sam's smart, he's logical, he's obstinate and rebellious, but he isn't brave. He's never had a reason to be. But now, after hearing Dean's confession to Lucas, he realizes that, maybe, finally, he does.


	4. Flight of Fear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x4: "Phantom Traveler"

"You okay?"

Sam sees Dean make the decision to tell the truth like it's happening in slow motion. The lie is already beginning to form—it's in the jerk of Dean's head, the tightening of his lips—but even as Sam starts to evaluate whether it's worth it to press Dean on this one, everything stops. For a moment his brother just stands there, his mouth open but no words coming out. Then he drops his defensive posture and sinks into one of sheer agitation.

"No. Not really."

"What? What's wrong?" Sam asks, less astonished by Dean's anxiety than by the fact that he's admitting to it.

Dean grimaces. "Well, I kinda have this problem with, um…" He trails off helplessly, making a motion with his hand like a child's imitation of a plane.

"Flying?"

"It's never really been an issue until now!"

"You're joking, right?"

"Do I look like I'm joking?" says Dean miserably. "Why do you think I drive everywhere, Sam?"

Sam shakes his head, incredulous. With everything they've faced, all the horrors Dean claims not to be afraid of,  _this_  is the one thing his brother can't handle?

But there's no time to wonder at it, no time to stand here talking at all. "All right, I'll go."

"What?"

"I'll do this one on my own."

"What, are you nuts?" Dean demands, suddenly sounding a little more like himself. "Sam, you said it yourself, that plane's gonna crash!"

"Look, Dean, we can do it together, I can do this one by myself—I'm not seeing a third option here."

"Aw, come on! Really?"

Dean shifts uncomfortably under Sam's urgent stare, his eyes darting toward the exits as if he's considering making a break for it.

"Man," he says finally, and Sam knows he's given in.

* * *

Minutes later, standing in line to buy tickets for the flight, Sam struggles to make sense of what's just happened. Dean is out at the car, trying to figure out what supplies they have that might be effective against a demon and yet still make it past airport security. Sam's willing to bet it won't be much; even the holy water won't make it through unless Dean pours out enough to get it down to three ounces. He'd wanted to make a crack about being worried Dean might not return, but he thought it might hit a little too close to home.

Through all the turmoil of Sam's life, through all the changes and uncertainties that come with chasing monsters all over the continental U. S., the one constant in Sam's life has been his brother. Ghosts, demons, spirits, phantoms—Sam's seen him face them all with a grin on his face. Even as recently as this morning, Dean was telling him that he doesn't have nightmares, and seeing how easily and deeply his brother sleeps, Sam almost believes him. Dean has always been unshakable—not fearless, but capable of shoving his fear down into a place so dark and so deep that it's easy for Sam to let himself think it isn't there at all.

But something's happening now, something Sam doesn't understand. First it was Dean's confession to Lucas, and now this freak-out about the plane. Suddenly cracks are starting to show in the image Dean has so carefully constructed, and Sam isn't at all sure how he feels about that. If the fragile image of his idol shatters, will he even recognize the man hiding underneath?

 _Yes,_  he thinks as he watches Dean come back into the terminal with a mostly empty duffel bag slung over his shoulder. Because terrified or not, Dean is still getting on this plane with him, and Sam knows why. There's no way in this world his brother would let him get on a doomed flight with a bloodthirsty demon and not be there by his side. Whatever else Dean might be going through, that much hasn't changed. Dean is still doing what he's always done: facing down his worst nightmares for the sake of protecting his younger brother. And if Sam now knows a little more of what's going on behind his brother's bravery… well, maybe it's about time he did.


	5. Secrets Better Kept

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x5: "Bloody Mary"

The cops are most definitely a complication.

It irritates Dean that on top of all the supernatural hazards this job entails, they're also constantly having to deal with law enforcement. Technically they and the nation's finest are on the same side; the Winchesters simply happen to be infinitely more competent at their job. Seems like they ought to get some sort of special badge of their own that they can flash at crime scenes with potential paranormal activity: "Dean and Sam Winchester, professional hunters. We'll be taking over jurisdiction of this case. Thank you, your assistance is no longer required. Now go away."

Instead they have to watch out for the police on top of everything else. Evading arrest seems like a pretty mundane concern compared with the possibility of having your eyes liquefy and bleed out your skull, but as Dad always told him, no plan is complete unless it factors in both.

This plan… This plan was incomplete, Dean realizes as the storefront is suddenly flooded with bright lights. As always, the police's timing is impeccable: Sam has just said the third and final "Bloody Mary," and the vengeful ghost could be aroused at any moment. Dean briefly considers staying put and letting the police situation sort itself out, but he knows that if the cops get here before Bloody Mary does, they may never get another chance at her. Which means Sam and that Charlie girl are both dead.

"Let me check that out; you stay here. Be careful," he says, moving towards the door. "Smash anything that moves!"

Sam nods, hefting his crowbar. Dean only hopes it will be enough.

* * *

" _You know, her boyfriend killing himself, that's not really Charlie's fault," Dean observes, picturing the poor girl cowering on her bed where they left her, every mirror and reflective surface carefully covered._

_Sam stares out the windshield at the pouring rain. "You know as well as I do, spirits don't exactly see in shades of gray, Dean. Charlie had a secret. Someone died. That's good enough for Mary."_

_Dean purses his lips doubtfully. "I guess."_

" _You know, I've been thinking," Sam continues, "It might not be enough to just smash that mirror."_

" _Why, what do you mean?"_

" _Well, Mary's hard to pin down, right? I mean, she moves around from mirror to mirror, so who's to say that she's not gonna just keep hiding in them forever?"_

_Dean frowns, unsure what he's driving at._

" _So, maybe, we should try to pin her down. You know, summon her to her mirror and_ then _smash it."_

" _How do you know that's gonna work?"_

" _I don't. Not for sure."_

" _Well, who's gonna summon her?" Dean asks, a hint of patient condescension in his voice. His genius brother, of all people, should remember that spirits have rules, and this "Bloody Mary's" set seems to be pretty specific: she takes victims who secretly have, directly or indirectly, been responsible for someone's death._

_Sam stares out the window again, his eyes following the rhythmic sweep of the windshield wipers. "I will. She'll come after me."_

* * *

Sometimes lying isn't good enough.

Dean has used the "boss's kid" line to great effect in the past, but it apparently doesn't work so well on cops who aren't willing to buy into the idea that an Asian guy might have adopted a White kid. Pretty racist, but then again, they might just be going by the confusion on his face when they told him the store owner's very long, very Japanese name. He quickly decides to take the more efficient, if also more illegal, route of clocking them both. He doesn't have time for this. Sammy's life is on the line.

It's much too quiet as he reenters the store, the air thick with psychic tension. He catches sight of Sammy, crouching on the floor with his face in his hands, his crowbar lying useless beside him. The cursed mirror is still behind him, black, ominous, and unbroken.

Dean seizes the crowbar he stowed on the way out and launches himself at the mirror. It shatters, showering him and Sam with shards of glass and leaving the empty frame yawning open like a black hole.

He drops to his knees. "Sammy? Sammy!" He takes his brother's head in his hands, his heart jolting as his fingers feel the warm wetness on his cheeks. The eyes. He has to see Sammy's eyes.

Slowly, his brother lets him lift up his head until they're face to face.

"It's Sam," he croaks out.

Dean laughs with relief. There's blood running down from the corners of Sam's eyes, but they're still, miraculously, intact. Never in his life has Dean been so happy to see them. "You okay?"

"Yeah."

He pulls Sam to his feet and wraps his brother's arm over his shoulders, supporting him.  _It's all right,_  he thinks as they begin to move towards the door.  _It's over._

Then he hears glass crunching behind him, and his senses, honed by years of experience, pick up a sudden drop in the temperature. He turns, knowing all too well exactly what he's going to see.

_Not yet._

* * *

_Sam won't return his gaze. Dean's known they would have to talk about this: the not sleeping, the nightmares, the screaming out Jessica's name. He's tried to give Sam space, tried to let him come to him in his own time, but this is too far. Shades of gray or not, there's no way anyone, human or spirit, could blame Sam for what happened to his girlfriend. Dean knows the gray; he's lived in the gray. And as far as he's concerned, Sammy is as white as snow._

" _Now listen to me._ It wasn't your fault. _"_

_Sam's jaw tightens, and he gives the tiniest shake of his head._

" _If you want to blame something, then blame the thing that killed her. Or here, why don't you take a swing at me—I mean, I'm the one that dragged you away from her in the first place."_

_That finally gets a reaction. "I don't blame you."_

" _Well, you shouldn't blame yourself. 'Cause there's nothing you could have done."_

" _I could've warned her."_

" _About what? You didn't know it was gonna happen!"_

 _Sam instantly shuts down again, turning back to stare out at the rain._ What have I said wrong now? _Dean wonders._

_Still, he presses on. "And besides, all of this isn't a secret; I mean, I know all about it. It's not gonna work with Mary anyway." There it is. That's the answer. Bloody Mary exposes secrets, and no matter how convinced Sam is that he's guilty, there's still nothing Mary can do to him._

_But Sam is still staring out the window. "No, you don't."_

" _I don't what?"_

" _You don't… know all about it." Sam glances at him. "I haven't told you everything."_

" _What are you talking about?"_

" _Well, it wouldn't really be a secret if I told you, would it?"_

_Dean's stomach drops. He can't believe this is happening right now, can't believe that Sam is actually going to do this. "No," he says firmly. "I don't like it. It's not gonna happen. Forget it."_

" _Dean, that girl back there is going to die. Unless_ we _do something about it."_

And if somehow Bloody Mary decides you actually are guilty, then you're going to die. Unless  _I_  do something about it.

" _And who knows how many more people are gonna die after that? Now we're doing this."_

_Dean just looks at him, trying to summon up the words to stop this insanity._

" _You've_ got _to let me do this."_

* * *

No. He didn't have to. Because there was something he could have said to stop Sam. He could have said, "Let me do it."

But there are some secrets that are better kept, even between brothers.

Besides, Dean had reasoned, nothing would actually happen to Sam. He would be by his side the entire time, and the second there was a flicker of motion in the cursed mirror, he would smash it, and that would be that. No pain, no blood, just a shattered mirror and a defeated ghost and another job well done. That was the way it was supposed to go.

The dark figure shuffles toward them now, her face hidden by the swinging black curtain of her hair. Dean feels a sudden warmth behind his eyes, a tightness in his face, his chest. He struggles to stay upright, but he's fading fast. The blood clouds his vision, and he feels rather than sees Sam collapse on the ground next to him. His muscles spasm, and his head rolls uncontrollably to the side. Through a red haze, he catches a glimpse of his bloody face in a mirror propped against a chair. So this is how he is going to die, with the evidence of his guilt on his face for all the world to see.

_Guilt…_

With a tremendous effort of will, he forces his arm to reach out, to find the edge of the mirror and pull it toward him. Slowly, he turns it so that its black reflective surface faces the decaying form of Bloody Mary.

Her shuffling gait comes to a stop. With a deathly gasp, she raises her head. A harsh voice rips out from the mirror grasped in his shaking hands:  _"You killed them. All those people._ You _killed them."_

The ghost whimpers, and suddenly her face begins to deform, her body melting until she is no more than a puddle of blood in the midst of the shattered glass.

The tightness releases, and all at once Dean is able to breathe. He sits up, throwing the mirror onto the bloody remains with a crash. The room goes still and quiet.

"Hey, Sam?"

"Yeah?"

"This has gotta be like, what, 600 years bad luck?" He looks around, taking in the shattered remnants of who knows how many mirrors.

Sam chuckles weakly.

* * *

Dean peals out as he drives away from Charlie's house. She's safe from the ghost now, but she's still got some old wounds that'll take time to heal. Sam's unexpected advice—to forgive herself, that sometimes bad things just happen—well, hopefully it'll do some good. More important, hopefully Sammy will take that advice himself.

"Hey, Sam?"

"Yeah?"

"Now that this is all over, I want you to tell me what that secret was."

Sam looks away for a minute, his face thoughtful. "Look," he says finally, "you're my brother. And I'd die for you. But there's some things I need to keep to myself."

Dean looks at him for a minute. He wants to insist, to demand that Sam tell him. But how can he? Sam still hasn't said anything about the blood streaming down from his eyes when Mary came out of that mirror; maybe he hasn't even made the connection. But maybe he has. And Dean really doesn't want to know.

There are some secrets that are better kept, even between brothers.


	6. Imagine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x6: "Skin"
> 
> TW for suicidal!Dean.

Dean moves slowly toward the lifeless body— _his_  lifeless body—flung across two stools at the edge of the room. Two black, bloody holes in its chest assure him that the thing is dead. He looks into its eyes, blank and staring out of its motionless face. A part of him had hoped it might revert to those luminous, inhuman eyes that had been caught on the security camera, but no, these are his eyes, green and empty and dead.

"So this is what it would look like," he murmurs to himself.

All at once, he feels Sammy staring at him, and he glances up. Even beaten and bloody, his little brother still seems to see too much, and the pain in his face has nothing to do with his injuries.

Dean looks back at the shape shifter's corpse. With sudden fierceness, he yanks his amulet from its neck and tucks it away into his shirt pocket. Then he nods. Yes, this is what it would look like. He doesn't have to imagine anymore.

* * *

" _How many chances am I gonna have to see my own funeral?"_

Dean sees Sam try to smile at the joke, just the briefest, tiniest upward curl of his lips. But he knows Sam doesn't think it's funny. Truth be told, he doesn't either.

Because he has seen his own funeral, more times than he can count. It's a morbid fantasy he's built up in his mind over and over. Sometimes there's a casket, with his body lying motionless, his eyes closed, hands folded across his chest. There are wards inside, made from iron and silver, and a thin line of salt all around his body, just to be safe. Dad wants his spirit to rest in peace. Other times, Dad's even more cautious and has him cremated, although Sammy foolishly has a handful of his ashes preserved in a special little box that he carries in his pocket, or in a locket he wears around his neck. And maybe Dean does kind of haunt him, but in a "guardian angel" sort of way, if there is such a thing.

How he dies is different every time. There's no shortage of monsters and fiends to envision clawing out his innards or sucking his soul from his body; he encounters a new one every week. It might be a basic run-of-the-mill ghost that gets him in the end, or perhaps he meets a bloody death at the claws of a wendigo. Maybe a demon possesses him and forces him to blow himself up. But by far the most common death he imagines, the one that has scared and fascinated him more and more as he's gotten older, is the one he inflicts on himself. It's the gun with the silver bullets he uses to blow his own brains out. It's the wickedly sharp knife he plunges into his chest. It's the cliff overlooking a rocky coast over which he drives the Impala at 90 mph, destroying himself and his beloved car along with him.

With every imagined suicide comes a new reason, and perhaps those are what change most of all. Dad's pushed him to his limit, and he feels he can't take it anymore. He's let Dad down because his reflexes were too slow, he wasn't strong enough, he misunderstood the instructions, he failed to remember something important. He's succeeded in his assignment, but an innocent person died, someone he should have been able to save. He wasn't by Sammy's side when he needed him and Sammy's been hurt, nearly killed. Sammy's gone away to college, and now, even with Dad here, he's so, so alone.

So many reasons.

What never changes is that it's just Dad and Sam at the funeral. Who else would come? He doesn't have any friends to speak of, and there's not a single girl he's dated who truly cared that much. But it's all right. He doesn't need anyone else.

In all the scenarios where something kills him, Dad is okay. He's quiet and stern, arguing with the priest over the necessity of the wards because Dad knows things priests don't. He doesn't stay long after the ceremony is over; he immediately goes off to track down the thing that killed his son. He might spend years pursuing it, but that's all right, because as long as it's out there, he won't have to fully deal with the fact that Dean is gone.

The suicides are harder. Dad has to face up to his death, then. He can't put himself and Sammy through another twenty years of revenge seeking because there's nothing to take revenge on. The killer and the victim are lying together in the same coffin. Maybe Dad will realize that, in many ways, he drove him to it; maybe he won't. Dean is never sure which he wants. Either way, he knows Dad will grieve. Not as much as for Mom, perhaps, but he will grieve.

But Sammy… This is the part that always hurts the most. Because Sammy won't just grieve; he'll be devastated. Dean's death will shatter Sammy's world into a million pieces, and he will never—especially if Dean kills himself—never be able to put it back together again. Stupid, screwed up, worthless failure that he is, he's all Sammy's got.

And in the end, that's the only thing that makes him un-cock the gun, put down the knife, switch off the car.

But it's never stopped him from imagining. Not till now. Not till he's seen his own chest riddled with bullet holes and his empty eyes staring at nothing. Not till he's seen the way Sammy looked after seeing those things.

Suddenly, he never wants to imagine them again.


	7. College Material

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is based on something else I found on Pinterest. There's no original poster given, and the entire thing is written in hashtags, but I thought it showed some really profound insight into Dean's character. The post is tagged to Ep. 1x4: "Phantom Traveler" and shows the scene where Dean is using an EMF meter he designed from a "busted-up old Walkman." The poster points out that Dean is actually a genius, but he sees himself as a "grunt" because he probably never had a teacher who gave him a real chance. Having moved around so much, and likely getting into fights as a kid to protect Sammy from bullies or (let's be honest) over girls, his record isn't great, and his teachers might have judged him based on that. Eventually, he stopped trying and just accepted that Sam was the smart one and he was stupid.
> 
> As a teacher myself, this was a really hard chapter to write. I just want so badly now to go back and be that teacher who gave Dean a chance. Because no child should ever feel like this.
> 
> Tag to Ep. 1x7: "Hook Man"

So this is college. It's crazy how a place can be right up Dean's alley and at the same time so completely outside his comfort zone. The frat party where he waits around for Sam is a scene that might have been made-to-order just for him—beer by the bucket load, hot sorority chicks by the dozen…  _Yes,_  he thinks with a grin,  _I'd have fit into this side of college just fine._

A thought pops into his head, a small, mean little thought he immediately crushes into a ball and shoves to the back of his mind with all the other bits of jealousy and resentment he's built up over the years:  _Maybe this is how Sammy spent his time at college. Maybe he's not such a perfect little genius after all._  It's a stupid thought, anyway; he knows Sam better than that. His geek brother spent all his time in the library, of course. Sam confirms as much as soon as he shows up, bringing with him exactly the information they need to decipher the Hook Man's connection to Lori Sorenson. Dean had expected no less.

For him, on the other hand, this library is starting to feel like a death trap. First it was the mountain of arrest records, and now this endless paper trail trying to track down Karns's hook. They've been at it for hours, but Sam barely seems to have noticed; he's still sitting there patiently, poring over that old book as though it isn't a massive waste of their time. Dean's eyes are burning, and his brain has long since stopped being able to make sense of the tangled sums and records in his own tome. Ten more minutes of breathing book dust and he'll suffocate. It's sheer luck that his eyes happen to fall on the right part of the page— _"Karns, Jacob: Personal Effects, Disposition Thereof"_ —and when that ends up sending them off on another search through the church records, it's all he can do not to flip the table. How did Sammy survive four years of this torture? He'd have been lucky to make it four days.

" _You don't have to be a college graduate to be a genius."_  That's what he told Sam the other night. And he believes it, partly; he knows it's true of Dad at least. Of course, the rock salt shells Sam was admiring at the time were entirely his own invention, but that wasn't genius, just common sense with a little creativity thrown in. Nothing to sneeze at, but not exactly college material, either.  _He's_  not exactly college material. Because Sammy's always been the smart one, and they both know it.

Dean was the kid teachers whispered about in the lounge at lunch. Teachers always said they loved all their students equally and believed everyone had the potential to succeed, but Dean figured out by the third grade that that was bull. The teacher had you pegged before you ever walked into her classroom, and there wasn't a thing in the world you could do to change that. No point in telling her that all those suspensions on your record are for fighting kids who were bullying your little brother. No way to even  _try_  to explain that you've switched schools so much because your Dad moves all over the country fighting demons, not because you're such a bad student. Not worth it to tell her that you don't hate reading because you're stupid, you hate it because you're not good at sitting still, and taking away that pencil grip you were playing with actually makes it harder to focus, not easier.

So he got stuck in the remedial classes, doing the same stuff over and over and over until any love of learning he might once have had shriveled up and died, and he became exactly what they all thought he was: lazy, careless, rebellious, disrespectful of authority. He spent most of middle school in detention and most of high school goofing off in the back of the classroom, generally with one or more of the cheerleaders. He skated by on  _C_ s and  _D_ s, and when an  _F_  cropped up now and again, he didn't sweat it too much. There came a point when he could no longer help Sammy with his homework, and that bothered him a lot more than the fact that he could barely do his own, but hunting and training offered more than enough excuses to avoid having to show his ignorance. Besides, Sam didn't really need his help anyway. He graduated only two years ahead of Sammy, having been held back in the third and sixth grade, and managed to miss his appointment with the guidance counselor enough times that she eventually forgot about him. She was probably no more eager to tell him he didn't have much of a future than he was eager to hear it, anyway. College was never on the table. Neither was any career they would tell you about at a school.

He's a hunter. That's all he's good at, and it's all he'll ever be good for.

And so, with the Hook Man defeated and Sammy all bandaged up and bundled back into the car, he's ready to shake the dust of this college town off his tires and head out to find another hunt.


	8. Apologize

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x8: "Bugs"

People always get the brothers' roles reversed. Ask anyone they've ever worked with on a job, any teacher they had when they were kids, any of the few childhood friends they had besides each other, and they would all tell you that Dean is the fighter and Sam is the peacemaker. And in one sense, they're right: Dean is the one who's ready to start throwing punches whenever negotiations begin to go south, while Sam turns on the charm and brings out the puppy dog eyes; it was Dean's school record that was riddled with suspensions for fighting. There's no denying that Dean is overprotective or that he tends to choose the easiest solution to a problem, even if it involves violence.

But Sam knows the truth: Dean hates conflict. When they come home at the end of the day, when the schoolbooks are put away and the weapons are packed up, it isn't Dean who's still cruising for a fight. It's Sam.

There's a look Dean gets whenever Dad and Sam start arguing again, when a disagreement over a minor issue escalates into the bitter accusations and hateful retorts, and then the cursing, and then the shouting and screaming six inches from each other's faces that is probably the closest Sam's been to Dad in physical proximity in years. It's this sort of pained confusion, like Dad and Sam are the broken halves of a whole that ought to fit together and yet, for some unfathomable reason, don't. Again and again Dean throws himself into the breach, trying to be the tape, or the glue, or the thread, or the nails that will hold the two of them together, but they inevitably fall apart again. And when they do, it hurts Dean more than it does either of them.

* * *

"Sam, you know perfectly well we're going hunting tonight. You'll just have to call and tell Dustin you can't come."

"Dad, I told him three weeks ago I'd be there, and this hunt just came up yesterday. It's a prior commitment."

"I'm sure Dustin can understand that family comes first."

Sam stares up at Dad in disgust, unwilling to dignify that with an answer. "Family comes first" is just Dad's way of saying they all do whatever he wants, whenever he wants it, which somehow always conflicts with anything Sam wants to do.

"What's a group of sixth graders going to do that's so much more important than our job, anyway?" Dad says.

"Hang out," Sam answers. "Eat pizza. Play videogames. Do normal stuff like normal kids whose families aren't freaks."

"Normal kids have moms who weren't killed by—"

"I'm not the only kid in the world who's ever lost a parent, okay? Dustin doesn't have a dad. Neither does Will. You don't see them spending their Friday nights off on some—"

"Dustin's and Will's parents are divorced, Sam. It's not the same thing. Us Winchesters, we've got unfinished business with—"

"Oh, so you've finally found the thing that killed Mom? We're going to get our revenge tonight, is that it?"

Dad sighs. "Every evil thing we kill—"

"Just leads to the next thing, and the next thing, and the next. It never has anything to do with Mom, and it never ends. You're obsessed."

"Would you rather I was blind to it? Knowing what's out there all around us, would you rather we just keep our eyes closed?"

"Maybe! If that's what it takes for me to have one night of fun with my friends!"

The kitchen door bangs open, and Dean comes in with his arms full. "Hey, Dad, I got the extra salt and lighter fluid. Did you get a chance to—" He trails off as he takes in the confrontation before him. His face gets that look, the one that makes Sam want so badly to stop fighting with Dad so his brother won't look so hurt and confused anymore. But it always seems like by the time Sam sees it, he's in too deep to turn back.

"What's going on?" Dean asks, his voice quiet and brittle.

"Sammy is abandoning us tonight," Dad answers, delivering the accusation in an impossibly calm tone.

"It's not like that," Sam protests angrily. "It's Dustin's birthday, and he asked me and the other guys weeks ago if we could come spend the night at his house and play videogames. I already told him I'd be there; it's not my fault Dad found a new hunt at the last minute."

Dean looks hard at him, and Sam can read the lack of understanding in his eyes. At sixteen, Dean has just gotten his driver's license, giving him a level of freedom that Sam can only dream about, and yet it never even seems to have occurred to him to try to establish some independence from Dad. Dean rarely has friends at all, and he never puts them ahead of family business. But this is important to Sam, and he hopes his brother can see that, even if it doesn't make sense to him.

"It's okay, Dad," Dean says after what seems like a long time. "You and I can handle this one. We could let Sammy off the hook tonight."

"It's a poltergeist, Dean," Dad replies. "It's gonna take all of us."

"You and I have done poltergeists on our own."

"Yes, and you got a concussion last time. What about it, Sammy? Are you willing to bear the responsibility if Dean gets hurt because you weren't there to help?"

"Dad, that's not fair," Dean says sharply, taking a step closer to Sam.

"And what about Sammy," Dad goes on, "staying at someone else's house tonight? I suppose Dustin's family salts all the windows and doors before they go to bed?"

"Of course not," Sam mutters under his breath. "They're not weirdoes."

"They're not prepared," says Dad. "They don't know what's out there, so they're not safe. And if you go over there tonight, you won't be either."

"Or maybe I'll be safer than usual, considering I'll be away from our wacked-out, demon-chasing family," Sam retorts.

Dad lets out a string of curses at him. Dean flinches, but Sam doesn't move a muscle. He's heard it all; there's nothing Dad can say to touch him anymore.

"Fine," Dad growls at last. "Do what you want. Go if it's so important to you. Goof off, have fun. Dean and I will be out doing our job. Just know that you're making it more dangerous for us." He stalks out of the kitchen, slamming the door behind him.

Dean sets his supplies down on the table and sinks into a chair, looking worn out. Sam is still standing in the center of the kitchen, his hands balled into fists.  _Good._  He's won. And none of Dad's guilt tripping is going to diminish his victory.

"You're really not coming with us, Sammy?" Dean asks.

"I promised Dustin. And anyway, what's wrong with being normal for one night?"

Dean sighs. Then he takes a container of salt from one of the bags and holds it out towards him. "Take this with you then, okay? Use it to make a line around your sleeping bag. At least then you'll have a little bit of protection."

Sam rolls his eyes. He's made every effort  _not_  to let his friends in this town know how weird his family is; no way is he going to ruin it now by salting his sleeping bag. Still, he takes the container. As usual, his brother just wants him to be safe.

* * *

"Upstairs or downstairs?" asks Dad.

"I'll take upstairs," Dean replies.

Dad nods. "Okay. Don't do anything until you've laid down the salt lines. The second it senses what you're trying to do, it'll attack."

"I know, Dad." Dean hefts the duffel containing the four packets of ingredients for the purification ritual, along with a mallet and enough salt to set up several safe zones.

"If you get trapped in one spot and it's not safe to move, don't try to get out. Call and wait for me to come get you."

"I know, Dad."

"Stay away from windows, lamps, anything with a cord that could be used for strangling."

"Seriously, Dad, I know. Let's go get this thing already."

Dad smiles. "That's my boy."

They split up, Dean moving up the stairs while Dad heads into the living room. For a while, the only sound is the shaking of the salt containers as they set up safe zones at each of the four corners of their respective floors. The very stillness of the house suggests the ghost's awareness of their activity—even normal nighttime sounds of furniture settling are absent—but all remains quiet until Dad strikes the first hammer blow.

Dean immediately begins attacking the drywall in the master bedroom with practiced speed and precision. A crash from below indicates that the ghost is targeting Dad first, which was the goal; now Dean just has to focus on getting the job done without thinking about what's going on down there. Dad knows how to handle himself.

He places the first packet and sprints to the kids' bedroom opposite. A cavalcade of toy cars rolls out from under the bunk bed as he passes it, tripping him up and sending him sprawling headfirst through his carefully constructed salt line. Looks like the ghost has found him. With a grunt, he picks himself up and frantically tries to reform the line as the contents of a child-size tool set begin hurling themselves at his face. He listens for the sound of Dad's mallet below, but he's too distracted by the commotion and the wrench he's just taken to the forehead. Too small for another concussion, hopefully.

The salt line remade, he turns to the wall to see that the flying tools have already caused some damage. With an ironic grin, he swings the mallet at the biggest dent and busts the wall wide open with a few blows. With a quick motion, he places the second packet.  _Halfway there._

By now the bedroom looks like a war zone, projectiles flying and the huge bunk bed cutting a groove in the floor as it slides back and forth to block his way. Dean is pretty sure this fits the definition of "trapped," but he doesn't want to call Dad just yet; maybe if the poltergeist is expending enough energy throwing toy projectiles at him, it won't be able to focus on hitting Dad with the really dangerous stuff in the kitchen.

Just as that thought crosses his mind, though, a horrible yell rings out from below. For a moment Dean stands frozen, heart hammering in his chest, wrestling with the choice between following Dad's orders and possibly saving his life. Then, abandoning the mallet and duffel, he launches himself forward through the gap between the upper and lower bunks. He ducks and rolls out into the hallway and stops at the railing along the top of the stairwell. He springs to his feet.

There's no time to react between the moment when he sees the taut lamp cord flying at him and the moment when it clotheslines him, sending him over the railing and down to the landing below.

A sickening crunch in his right leg leaves no room for doubt even before the pain catches up with him, and he screams out a curse. Toys from the bedroom above begin raining down on his head. Spurred by the mental image of the bunk bed following them out to crash through the railing on top of him, he drags himself painfully away from the stairwell.

Dad bursts out of the kitchen into the hall. His left forearm is bleeding badly, but he seems otherwise okay. Dean mentally curses himself for overreacting; of course he should have known that Dad could handle it.

"Dean!" Dad drops to his knees beside him. "What happened?"

"Fell… down the stairs…" Dean grunts between his teeth.

"Which corners are left?"

"North… and east…"

"Where's the duffel?"

"Kids' room."

With that, Dad charges up the stairs, dodging the toy projectiles. The bunk bed comes through the railing just as he reaches the top, but he manages to avoid it, and it thunders to the bottom with a crash. Dean winces, glad he isn't underneath it.

The crashing and banging follows Dad through the upper floor of the house, but it barely slows him down. Within ten minutes, the noise subsides as Dad places the final piece of the ritual.

A moment later, Dad reappears at his side and, wounded arm notwithstanding, picks him up and carries him out of the house.

* * *

Sam very nearly didn't take the call. He was winning—he's pretty good at gaming for someone who almost never gets to play—and when he felt his phone going off, he was ready to dismiss it as just another warning about the salt lines or some other dumb crap. But then guilt got the better of him, and he picked up. It's a good thing he did.

He's in the car now with Dustin's older brother Steve, heading up to the hospital as fast as the speed limit will allow. Steve has tried a couple times to get him to talk, but even if Sam could tell him anything beyond, "My brother broke his leg," he wouldn't be able to say much. A guilty pit has opened up in his stomach, and all he can think is,  _This wouldn't have happened if I was there._  Dad didn't say it on the phone, but Sam could hear it in his tone: he blames him. Why shouldn't he? Dad said they were going to need his help, but he didn't listen. All he cared about was that stupid party, and now Dean is hurt, just like Dad predicted.

Dad meets him in the lobby. "Hi, Sammy," he says, the greeting stiff and cold.

"Hey, Dad," Sam answers. He's just relieved Dad hasn't launched into a tirade yet; he wants to see his brother first. "Where's Dean?"

"This way."

Dad leads him to an elevator and then down a long hallway. Sam doesn't pay much attention to his surroundings; he's been inside enough hospitals not to find them interesting anymore. The silence as they walk is full of tension.

The instant the door opens, Sam rushes to Dean's bedside. "Dean!"

"Hey, Sammy."

Sam takes stock of the damage. The cast goes all the way up Dean's thigh; he remembers Dad saying something on the phone about multiple breaks. "Are you in too much pain?" he asks anxiously.

"Right now?" his brother says with a wide grin. "Right now I'm high as a kite on painkillers; I can't feel a thing."

"How long before you can walk again?"

Dean's smile momentarily slips. "Um, how about we save unpleasant stuff like that till later?"

With growing dread, Sam looks back at Dad, knowing he'll tell him the truth.

"Three to six months for it to be back to normal," Dad answers.

_Three to six months?_  The pit in his stomach widens. Three to six months of Dean in pain, lying around going stir crazy, unable to drive or hunt or do any of the stuff he likes to do. That's what Sam's one night of normal has cost.

"So how was the party, Sammy?" Dad asks, the ice in his tone biting. "Was it worth it?"

"Dad, we talked about this," Dean cuts in before Sam can reply. "You are not gonna put this on him."

"Why not?" Dad demands. "If he'd been with us, this never would have happened."

"Dad, I was being stupid. I thought you were in trouble, so I disobeyed a direct order, and I paid for it. It would have happened just the same if Sam had been there."

"No, it wouldn't. Because if Sam had been in that house you would never have left him alone to come after me."

Dean opens his mouth again, but the protest dies on his lips. Dad's right, and they all know it.

After a long, uncomfortable silence, Dad says, "I'm gonna go grab a cup of caffeine." He leaves the room.

As soon as he's gone, Sam dissolves into tears. "Dean, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry I wasn't there."

Dean reaches a hand out to him, and he climbs up next to him in the hospital bed and buries his head in his brother's chest. "It's okay, Sammy. Whatever Dad says, it isn't your fault."

"Yes, it is! Dad's right, you're more careful when I'm around…"

"Oh, so now it's your job to hang around and keep me from being stupid?" Sam gives a choking laugh. Dean ruffles his hair affectionately. "You know, I really don't get it, dude, but it you've gotta have your normal time, then you have your normal time. Don't let your dumb, reckless big brother stop you."

Sam pulls away, shaking his head. "No. Normal is not worth this."

The left side of Dean's mouth pulls up in a cockeyed grin. "That's what I'm always trying to tell you. Freak."

"Weirdo," Sam shoots back with a half-smile, climbing down from the bed.

"Where're you going?"

"I gotta go find Dad."

"Why?"

"I want to apologize for everything I said to him. I don't want to fight with him anymore."

Dean smiles wistfully. "Yeah, sure, Sammy. You'll apologize, and then within five minutes you guys will be at each other's throats."

"No, I mean it," Sam protests earnestly. "I'm not ever leaving you alone again."

* * *

Dean had known it was an empty promise when Sammy made it. Sam and Dad would never stop fighting; they were at once too different and too alike. And Sam would leave him again, Dean had known that, too. He hadn't imagined it being for so long, or so completely, but he'd known Sam would try to run away from the hunting lifestyle again. Just as he'd known he'd eventually come back.

Sam leaves Matt Pike with his father and walks down the driveway, coming to lean against the side of the car next to Dean. "I want to find Dad," he says, his face full of longing as he looks back at them.

"Yeah, me too."

"Yeah, but I just…" Sam trails off, searching for the words. "I want to apologize to him."

Dean looks over at his brother. "For what?"

"All the things I said to him," Sam answers, shaking his head. "He was just doing the best he could."

Dean nods slowly, seeing for a moment the shaggy-haired twelve-year-old with the tear-stained face from ten years ago, instead of his gangly grown-up brother. "Well, don't worry, we'll find him. And you'll apologize. And then within five minutes you guys will be at each other's throats."

Sam chuckles and ducks his head in embarrassed acknowledgment, and Dean knows he's remembering the same scene. "Yeah, probably," he admits this time. After a moment, he adds, "Let's hit the road."

"Let's," Dean agrees.


	9. Somebody to Lean On

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x9: "Home"

" _You gonna be all right, man?"_

" _Let me get back to you on that."_

Yes. The correct answer was "yes." Even if the very sight of that house makes him want to turn the car around and drive as far and as fast as he can in the other direction, he should have told Sammy he was fine. What's wrong with him today? That one word, "home"—is that really all it takes to send him into a tailspin? Ever since this morning, ever since Sam made his case that they have to come back here, it's like he has no control over his emotions; whatever he feels is plastered all over his face for anyone to see.

This isn't how the older brother is supposed to act, he reminds himself. Sam is the one whose weirdo visions about people getting hurt are suddenly coming true; the last thing his brother needs to is to be worried about him on top of that. He's got to pull himself together, got to start doing his job again. He knows he's been getting lax—spilling his guts about the night Mom died, the total breakdown over the airplane incident, and now going to pieces over this… It's just that, with Dad gone AWOL and not even bothering to pick up the phone, Dean kind of feels like the rug has been pulled out from under him, and he's fighting madly to stay on his feet. Sometimes he just can't resist reaching out to grab onto his little brother for support.

But he knows that's got to stop. Sammy counts on him to be strong, and he's shown way too much weakness already. If he can't hold it together, he'll lose the trust Sam's always had in him. And with everything else he's lost, he can't afford to lose that, too.

* * *

The little girl's story about the fiery figure in her closet scares him like anything. He knows what it sounds like; Sam doesn't have to scream it in his face. After all these years… could it really be that simple? Could the thing that killed Mom have been lurking in that house all this time? He can't make his mind process it. His entire childhood has been spent preparing to kill this thing—studying, training, molding himself into the perfect soldier Dad wanted him to be—and now that the moment has come, if that's truly what this is, he isn't ready.

"I'll be right back," he mumbles to Sam. "Gotta go to the bathroom." He heads for the side of the gas station, fingers fumbling in his pocket to find his phone, to dial the familiar numbers.

" _This is John Winchester. If this is an emergency, call my son Dean."_

His heart sinks, though it was too much to hope that Dad would pick up.  _What if I have an emergency, Dad?_  he thinks in frustration. _Who am_ I  _supposed to call?_

"Dad? I know I've left you messages before. I don't even know if you get them." He works to swallow the lump in his throat. It's bad enough to break down in front of Sammy; it would be even worse to show his weakness to Dad.

"But I'm with Sam, and we're in Lawrence… and there's something in our old house." He pauses again, trying to collect himself. "I don't know if it's the thing that killed Mom or not, but… I don't know what to do." He cringes, hearing the tears that have crept into his voice, unable to take them back. It's no use. He just  _needs_  Dad right now, so badly. He can't do this without him. "So, whatever you're doing, if you could get here… Please. I need your help, Dad."

He flips the phone closed, fighting despair.

* * *

"If there's a dark energy around here, this room should be the center of it," says Missouri Mosely.

"Why?" Sam asks.

Dean knows why. He doesn't need a crazy old medium to tell him what happened here; he can see the fire, can feel the heat, can hear Dad's voice yelling in his head:  _"Take your brother outside as fast as you can! Now, Dean, go!"_  This is the room, the last place his Mom was seen alive. The last place her killer is known to have been.

Missouri moves slowly around the room, "sensing the energies" or whatever mumbo jumbo she supposedly does. Psychic or no psychic, he'll take the hard science of an EMF reader any day.

Still, his spirits lift a little when she says, "I don't know if you boys should be disappointed or relieved, but this ain't the thing that took your Mom."

"Are you sure?" Sam demands. "How do you know?"

"It isn't the same energy I felt the last time I was here. It's something different."

"What is it?" Dean asks. He can feel the disappointment radiating off Sam—his brother is still overcome by the desire to destroy whatever killed his girlfriend—but for the most part, Dean is relieved. They won't have to face that thing on their own.

"Not it.  _Them_ ," Missouri announces, wandering into the closet. "There's more than one spirit in this place."

Dean frowns as she goes off on some spiel about real evil leaving wounds that get infected—more spiritualist nonsense—but one thing she says makes sense to him: "It's attracted a poltergeist. A nasty one. And it won't rest until Jenny and her babies are dead."

Poltergeists, he can deal with. "Well, one thing's for sure," he says with determination. "Nobody's dying in this house ever again."

* * *

Gun in one hand and ax in the other, Dean sprints to the front door of the house. When a couple of kicks fail to dislodge the door, he lays into it with the ax, the wood splintering too slowly under his blows. Twice now he's almost lost Sam in this house—once when that fiend came after him as a baby, and again earlier tonight when the poltergeist nearly choked him to death with a lamp cord. Both times it's been Dean who saved him, and there's no way on this earth he's letting anything happen to his brother now.

"Sam!" he shouts as he finally busts out one of the panels. He can't see him. Two more blows knock out the lower panels of the door, and he crawls through and begins to search the house, calling out his brother's name.

He hears the crackle of flames as he strides through the hallway and finally catches sight of his brother, pinned to the wall by an invisible force. In front of him is a tower of fire, a human figure faintly visible at its center. Dean places himself between Sam and the ghost and levels his gun at it, ready to pump it full of rock salt.

"No, don't! Don't!" Sam cries.

"What? Why?"

"Because I know who it is," Sam answers, his voice growing soft. "I can see her now."

Dean stares at the spirit in confusion. As he watches, the flickering flames around its head begin to resolve themselves into locks of hair, and a face appears, gentle and serene in the midst of the fire. A face Dean knows.

Then the flames die out, and she's there, standing in front of him, exactly as he remembers her. Dean's hand begins to shake, and he lowers the gun. Her blonde hair falls gently over her shoulders, resting against the lace of her white nightgown, and her eyes stare at him with the tender love he's missed so much.

"Mom?" he whispers.

"Dean." She steps toward him, and he yearns to reach out and touch her, to run into her arms and bury his head in her chest as though he were a little boy again. But she isn't real. His mind knows that even as his heart wishes it could be true, that she were back, that his family could be whole again. She's only a spirit, who will vanish away into nothingness the moment he touches her.

She moves around him and approaches Sam, still pinned to the wall. Tears start from Sammy's eyes when she speaks his name, and Dean realizes that this will be the only memory of Mom his brother will ever have to hold onto. "I'm sorry," she whispers.

"For what?" Sam asks her.

She only looks at him, a world of grief in her eyes.  _For leaving you alone,_ Dean can almost hear her saying.  _For the fact that you never got to know the comfort of my hugs, the warmth of my kisses, the depth of my love. For our broken family, for your Dad's pain, for all the hardships you suffered growing up. For you not getting to have a mother._

But then she turns away, staring up at the thing holding Sam prisoner. "You," she says, her voice ringing with authority, "get out of my house. And let go of my son." The flames leap up again, beginning at her feet and rising to envelope her whole body. The blaze grows brighter and brighter, stretching upwards to the ceiling and outwards to fill the room until, with a final roar, it vanishes into thin air.

The pressure holding Sam to the wall releases, and he slumps forward. Besides the brothers' heavy breathing, there isn't a sound to be heard in the house.

"Now it's over," Sam says at last, and Dean sees another tear slip from his eye.

* * *

Even as he flips through the old photographs Jenny's given him, Dean keeps an eye on Sam, sitting with Missouri on the front porch. He hopes that whatever the crazy old psychic is saying to him over there, it'll help. He doesn't understand what's going on with Sam, why his little brother is suddenly having these prophetic dreams or how he knew there were still spirits in that house even after they were supposed to be gone. He didn't used to believe in this kind of thing. And now that he can't deny its existence anymore, he doesn't know what to do with the knowledge. He's pretty sure Sam feels the same way.

Whatever happens, though, he knows he'll be there for Sammy. He'll help him deal with the nightmares and listen to him talk through them, and when they tell him something bad is going to happen, then he and Sam will work together to stop it. And eventually, they'll figure this thing out. Together.

But in order to do that, he's got to be strong. No more breakdowns, no more "chick flick moments." If he's going to help Sam, he's got to be on his game, and that means not letting Sam see when he's weak. He still hasn't regained his balance, he still feels unsteady, but Sammy doesn't need to know that. It's time to go back to letting Sam lean on him instead of the other way around.

So the next time his brother asks, "Are you okay, man?" he'll have his answer ready: "Yeah, Sammy. I'm fine."


	10. Distance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tag to Ep. 1x10: "Asylum"

" _Do we need to talk about this?"_

" _No, no. I'm not really in the 'sharing and caring' kind of mood. Just want to get some sleep."_

Sam opens the passenger door and climbs in, a sick feeling settling in the pit of his stomach. He'd been hoping—idiotically—that an apology would be enough to gloss over all the awful things he said back there under the influence of Dr. Sanford Ellicott's little rage fest. He should have known it wouldn't be that simple. Dean seemed surprised he was even able to remember the incident, but that isn't the problem; the problem is whether he'll ever be able to forget those hateful words still drilling through his brain:

" _Why are we even here? 'Cause you're following Dad's orders like a good little soldier? 'Cause you always do what he says without question? Are you that desperate for his approval? That's the difference between you and me. I have a mind of my own. I'm not pathetic, like you."_

Those words have cut deep. He knows that. And in usual Dean fashion, his brother is going to just slap on a bandage and leave the wounds alone to fester.

" _I didn't mean it. Any of it,"_  he'd said to Dean. But he knows his brother doesn't believe him, and, truth be told, he isn't quite sure he believes it, either. Because every time he tries to convince himself it's true, his mind goes back to that visit to the psychiatrist's office a few hours before…

* * *

Dr. Ellicott—the currently living, non-criminally insane Dr. James Ellicott—leans back in his chair and fixes Sam with a look of patient attentiveness. "This brother you're road-tripping with… how do you feel about him?"

Sam stares back at him for a moment, floundering. He didn't plan for this. True, he did set up an appointment with a psychiatrist, but he had intended to be the one asking the questions. He'd had a vague idea of talking about Jess a little if Dr. Ellicott really insisted on getting personal, but he'd meant to be in and out before it got that far. But the doctor is refusing to tell him any more about Roosevelt Asylum until he tells something honest about himself, and of all things, he's hit upon his brother as the topic for discussion.

 _What can it hurt?_  Sam thinks. There's certainly enough dysfunction going on between him and Dean right now to provide plenty of fodder to satisfy a psychiatrist. It won't take much acting to convince the doctor that he's pretty messed up, and then he can get the story and get out of here.

"Um, yeah, my brother," he stammers, unsure where to start. "He's um, well, you know…"

Dr. Ellicott puts up a hand to interrupt him. "Just to let you know, Sam, anything you tell me here is purely confidential. Whatever you say, your brother will never know about it unless you want him to."

"Uh, thanks, Doc," says Sam uncomfortably. "It's not really like that, though. It's just… well, you know how older brothers are. He's kinda overbearing, you know?"

Dr. Ellicott nods encouragingly. "Overbearing? In what way?"

"Well, it's just that it's always his way or the highway. Like this road trip, for example—if Dean gets it in his head that we're gonna go someplace, then we're going there, no matter what I have to say about it."

"I see. So, for example, did you want to come here to Rockford?"

"No, I really didn't. But our Dad said we should come here, and Dean always does exactly what Dad says."

"Is your Dad traveling with you?"

"No, he's off on a business trip of his own at the moment."

"I see," the doctor says again. "And what's your relationship with your Dad like?"

Sam cringes. He was hoping not to end up here; brother issues are tame enough, but a psychiatrist could have a heyday with his daddy issues. "Dad and I are fine," he answers unconvincingly.

Dr. Ellicott gives him a patronizing smile. "Sam, the deal was that you had to be honest with me. What's going on between you and your Dad?"

"Nothing! At least, nothing new," Sam replies. "We just don't see eye-to-eye is all."

"But he and Dean do?"

"I don't know, it's more like Dean just does whatever Dad says whether he likes it or not. He never questions him, never disobeys an order. The perfect son, you know?"

The doctor nods. "And how does that affect your relationship with your brother?"

Sam pauses, thinking over how to answer. He's given Dr. Ellicott enough, been far more honest than he intended to be. He doesn't owe the man the story of his life; in fact, he probably owes it to Dean to shut his big mouth. Or does he? After all, Dean is acting like a serious jerk right now. Surely Sam's well within his rights to let off a little steam, especially to a psychiatrist of all people. Who knows, maybe it'll even help.

"You know, it's funny," he says finally, "usually Dean and I are great. But lately, it seems like all he does is order me around, and I'm sick of doing everything he tells me to do. Especially when it's actually just what Dad tells him. I mean, that stuff was fine when we were in grade school, but a 27-year-old man still kowtowing to his old man's every whim? Come on, Doc, there's got to be something screwed up about that."

Dr. Ellicott frowns thoughtfully. Then his next question hits Sam out of left field: "Sam, do you have a mother?"

"She passed away when I was a baby," Sam replies, looking away.

"I'm so sorry to hear that. How did your father deal with her passing?"

Sam scoffs. "He didn't. He's still not dealing with it to this day."

"And Dean?"

"I know it was hard for him. He was four, so he can still remember her a little. But somebody had to pull it together after Mom died, and it sure wasn't going to be Dad, so Dean ended up becoming the responsible one."

The doctor nods as if Sam has just handed him the final piece of a puzzle he's been trying to assemble. "Sam, tell me," he asks, "who would you say primarily raised you, your father or your brother?"

Sam looks at him in surprise. His first impulse is to say that his father raised him, of course, and a jacked-up upbringing it was, too. But then he stops. Images begin to flow through his mind, one after another. Dean reading him bedtime stories and rubbing his back until he fell asleep. Dean standing over the stove stirring a pot of SpagettiOs that for a long time was the only meal he knew how to fix but was better than going without because Dad was either too busy or too drunk to go to the grocery store. Dean taking the training wheels off Sam's bike and then holding onto the seat until he got steady enough to take off. Dean packing his school lunch and checking his homework and forging Dad's signature on his school agenda to prove that at least somebody was keeping up with his academics. All the normal things that parents are supposed to do, the one who did them for him was…

"Dean. It was Dean."

Dr. Ellicott nods again. "I thought that might be the case. You know, Sam, it's completely normal for a young man your age to chafe against parental authority, to want to establish some independence. The difference for you is that in order to do that, you're feeling the need to break away not just from your father's authority, but from your brother's—your second father's, if you will. That's bound to cause the kind of tension you've been describing to me."

Sam frowns. What the doctor's saying… it does sound like him. Only it's him from four years ago, before Stanford, when he was so desperate to get away from Dad's all-encompassing control over his life that he would have taken any way out he could find. He tries to recall what he felt toward Dean at the time. He remembers being reluctant to leave his brother, but it was more from concern that Dean wouldn't take care of himself without his little brother there being a pain in his butt, than from worry that he himself wouldn't be able to function without Dean. And even that had become subordinate to his frustration when Dean had taken Dad's side about him leaving. At that point, he truly had been ready just to get away from them both.

But that was then. He  _had_  gotten away from his Dad and his brother, and it had worked for a while, though sometimes the growing pains had been almost too much to bear. Then Dean had crash landed back into his life at what turned out to be exactly the right time, as the new life he'd built for himself literally went up in flames around him. Dean was there when Sam needed him most, and whatever other issues they have going on, he still is. It's too soon to think about leaving again. Isn't it?

"Sam?" Dr. Ellicott tries to reclaim his attention.

"Yeah, sorry, Doc. I was just… thinking."

"That's quite all right. I was just going to ask, how much longer are you planning to be on this road trip?"

"Uh, we hadn't really set a limit on it."

"Well, Sam, my recommendation would be to try to find an amicable way to wrap it up here soon. Then, why don't you see about setting out on your own for a change? Go to school, get a job, something that'll allow you to create some space for yourself. You know, however much we love our families, sometimes a little distance isn't such a bad thing."

Sam hides a wry smile. Right. Just press the reset button. Go back and do the whole thing over again and hope for a less tragic result this time.

Aloud, he says, "Thanks, Doc. I'll try and take your advice. Would you mind telling me about the asylum now?"

* * *

Sam glances at Dean's profile in the driver's seat next to him. There's a hard set to his brother's jaw, and he can tell by the detached look in his eye that Dean isn't actually listening to the Van Halen song blaring out of the speakers. Sam wonders if he's mentally replaying their conversation.

 _I didn't mean it,_  he wants so desperately to say again.  _Not a single word of it._  But Dean has made it clear that the subject is closed, and attempting to bring it up again probably won't get any response beyond the usual "No chick flick moments."

Anyway, Sam has already told that lie once. He isn't sure he can tell it again.


End file.
